GAWU Responds to Village Voice News’ Story

Dear Editor,

Our Union has taken note of an article titled “Ali Tells GAWU Sugar Is Vital—But Data Show Industry in Deep Trouble” published by the Village Voice on March 28, 2026. A cursory review of the article reveals that it seeks to embrace the same worn-out, tired explanations about the sugar industry that have been advanced time and again. Those rationales we must add have been debunked, yet the editorship and those who may guide and influence the ‘news’ entity, journalism, continue to publish distorted facts, undoubtedly aimed to justify what clearly was a sordid attempt to punish thousands of Guyanese sugar workers, their families, their communities and an entire industry.

The article highlights the industry’s cost of production. The challenges in this regard have been known for some time and stem from several factors arising from the industry’s suffocation during the 2015-2020 period of APNU+AFC governance. President Dr Mohamed Irfaan Ali, addressing the GAWU’s celebration of 50 years as a recognised union in the sugar industry, highlighted the situation when his Government took office in August 2020. He drew attention to the dilapidation of machinery and equipment, the forested overgrowth that had taken over cane fields, and the withering away of commitment arising from the paperisation of the workforce.

Of course, through to form and shaped by its distorted narrative and maybe nature, the Village Voice vainly attempts to deceive the Guyanese people, calling the era of the David Granger-led Administration in sugar “major restructuring”. That tale, of course, is clearly an obfuscation. During the rule of now former President Granger, the sugar industry saw:

1. The closure of four (4) estates – Skeldon, Rose Hall, East Demerara and Wales Estates
2. Some 7,000 workers who were made jobless
3. A shameless and shameful wage freeze imposed on workers
4. Reduction and abandonment of long-standing benefits and conditions
5. Disregard for workers’ role and organisations, some contrary to the law
6. As much as a 42 per cent reduction in real earnings
7. Clear, patent, and unbridled discrimination as workers in other state sectors and agencies benefited from pay rises and improvements, and sugar workers got none

 That was hardly a restructuring; it was, in our view, a clear attempt to crush the industry and trample on the workers. It was, as we see it, a pellucid policy to harm the sugar workers. Workers, we should add, who were courted and promised all sorts of ‘goodies’ for their support to the Coalition prior to the 2015 National and Regional elections. It turned out to be all lies, deceptions and glaring untruths.

Village Voice tells its readership, minimal as it may be, that the Coalition “…introduced measures to cushion the impact on displaced workers, including severance payments—at one stage committing to pay at least 50 per cent upfront…”. If it were not so serious, this would be laughable. We are aware that one of the regular and prominent contributors to the online news outlet is Lincoln Lewis, a long-time General Secretary of the Guyana Trades Union Congress (GTUC). Lewis has never failed to burnish the fact that he always stands with the workers. The GTUC official must, therefore, hang his head in shame to see an outfit he has been associated with for a considerable period actually advancing, and more so, glorifying a shameful attempt to breach our laws and the rights of workers.

The Village Voice well knows that the High Court, following the filing of an action by GAWU, condignly dealt with this matter and imposed massive interest charges and costs for the 50 per cent severance decision. The Court clearly stated that the workers were wronged and that their rights were betrayed. Of course, betrayal was a regular feature of the Coalition Government. It is disdainful that the Village Voice wants to say that the then Government attempted to “…cushion the impact on displaced workers…”. See what we said about worn-out explanations.

But the deception did not end there; the Village Voice claimed there were “…initiatives aimed at retraining and facilitating alternative employment.”  This again is another attempt to rewrite history. The so-called training programmes, if they can be called that, had no meaningful impact. Rather, just a handful of selected workers were given some training for a few weeks and left to fend for themselves. Certainly, had such objectives been met, the ILO socio-economic study in the post-closure period would not have concluded that most workers remained unemployed. And, even where a few secured employment, they were really worse off.

The Village Voice editors tell us that sugar’s miniaturisation “…was occasioned by economic strain on rural communities that relied heavily on the estates.” But that economic strain is what resulted in the aftermath of closure. But it was not merely economic; it was social, it was familial, it was alcoholism, it was petty theft, it was domestic violence, it was family disintegration, and so many other factors. This is the real and true cost of closure. This is the legacy that the APNU+AFC left in the industry. That was the indelible mark and the costly consequences of leaders and a government that chose discrimination over collaboration. A government which placed its apparent partisan political interests above the well-being of the nation and its people.

The Village Voice, we urge, should end the charade. It should be honest and not deceptive. It should stop misleading and obscuring. The facts are the facts, and no attempt to rewrite the narrative will succeed. Those who lived through it, experienced the hardship, confronted the sorrows, and were pushed into poverty know the pains. We urge the Village Voice to live up to its axiom and really be “the Voice of the People”.